


bound 2

by olavidalo



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Accidental/Undernegotiated Bondage, Brief Ableism, Cissexism, Disordered Eating, Dubious Consent, F/M, Gen, Kink exploration?, Lousy aftercare?, M/M, Mild bit of powerplay, Multi, Other, Prejudice, Sexual Discovery, erasure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-03
Updated: 2014-01-04
Packaged: 2018-01-07 07:50:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1117368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olavidalo/pseuds/olavidalo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Malik girls are fast, they say; they'll have you branded, wed, and taking care of the children before you can so much as wink. </p><p>As for the boys, well...good luck.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I. Um. Ha ha! Let's see where this one goes.  
> II. All lies. Unbeta'ed, unbritpicked, unpossible lies.  
> III. Title from like the Bible or something

 

'Oh, it's not what it looks like,' says Zayn. He doesn't even bother looking up.  
  
Niall looks again at Styles, whose face is pinker than he’s ever seen it, and forces himself to close the door. As his own bed is currently occupied by general Slytherinness, he decides to toss his cloak onto Ikenga’s. ‘Erm,’ he hesitates, ‘are you sure?’  
  
Zayn glances up from his textbook spread with a distant smile - Niall grins back reflexively - and then notices, somehow for the first time, the massive hard-on Harry Styles is sporting. He blanches.  
  
'Oh,' says Zayn.  
  
Styles makes a desperate sound through his gag. He starts wriggling a lot, like he’s trying to make himself smaller - but of course Zayn’s _Incarcerous_ won’t let him.  
  
Zayn sends Niall a grim look from behind his glasses - forget about a prank war, Tomlinson is going to _murder_ them.  
  
Ever attuned to the feel of a room, Arnie carefully and methodically buries himself under the covers.  
  
Lucky bastard.  
  
’ _Finite Incan_ - _tatem_ ,’ Niall says, slowly, so Styles can have a moment to get the feeling back in his limbs. Even after the ropes melt away, Styles stays on his side, trembling and still - hands tight behind his back, legs bent and pressed together.  
  
'…It might've just been adrenalin?,' Zayn says, after a second, sliding off his bed, 'sometimes...during times of, of high tension, the body can, ah—'  
  
He raises his wand, probably so he can take out the gag without having to touch him. Styles flinches horribly anyway.  
  
Zayn drops his hand at once.  
  
Niall sidles a little closer to Styles before he can lose his nerve, gives him a big smile when he looks up warily. ‘Hey,’ he says, trying not to think about what his mam will say when he gets expelled, ‘sorry about all this! I’m just going to take that thing out of your mouth. Is that okay?’  
  
Styles glances at Zayn. Zayn stares back at him frownily. Styles looks at Niall and shakes his head.  
  
'You don't want me to take the gag out?' Niall asks, trying to hide his confusion. He always knew Slytherins were mental - and here's proof!  
  
Styles glances again at Zayn. Zayn stares back at him with his head tilted. Styles looks at Niall and shakes his head.  
  
'—Do you want…Zayn to take the gag out?' Niall asks. He ignores the furious look Zayn shoots his way. They'll have time enough for that later.  
  
Styles glances at Zayn a third time - and nods slowly.  
  
'Oh,' says Zayn.

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

They don’t get expelled, and Tomlinson doesn’t murder them, but everytime they see Styles, he blushes and looks down, which is somehow even worse.  
  
'You reckon we should, like,' Niall says, staring wistfully out the library window at the Pitch, 'apologise?'  
  
Zayn scratches down the front of his neck, doesn’t look up from his scroll. ‘Hm?’  
  
Niall takes the out: ‘Never mind.’

 

* * *

 

It does explain some things, anyway. How Tomlinson went from bullying Styles mercilessly for being half-blood, to being his best friend. How Styles has slept with so many people but somehow only remained steady friends with _Grimshaw_ , the loudest and lewdest of the lot.  
  
Maybe Styles likes it when people are mean to him. Whatever.

 

* * *

 

The week Niall goes up to Greg’s for the baptism, Professor Vector gives Zayn full marks on his solution to Peitho’s proof. Though (she adds) citing al-Khwarizmi seems ‘superfluous’.  
  
'They think Merlin invented everything,' Ikenga says after class, rolling his eyes. Zayn feels a little better about it for a while but then he re-reads her note before dinner and gets irritated again.  
  
Ant and Magnus go on ahead without him, which means he’s completely alone by the time he runs into Styles.  
  
Styles blushes. This time he has good reason to look down (Zayn accidentally knocked all his books out of his arms) but instead he looks Zayn in the eye.  
  
'Um. hey,' he says, slowly, and then he glances around the hall, like he's hoping someone else will show up.  
  
Zayn thinks about how he cried a little, when he took the gag out; how he shuddered when Zayn wiped the drool off his chin with a handkerchief. How he went completely pliant and sweet when Niall stroked his hair.  
  
Probably he snuck into their room hoping to see Niall. Anybody in their right mind would.  
  
'Watch where you're going,' Zayn says, shortly, and then he walks around him.

 

* * *

 

Tomlinson comes over the next morning at breakfast and empties an entire ewer of greyberry syrup onto Zayn’s head.  
  
'Watch where you're going,' he says brightly. Zayn tosses Sibylla's cup of pumpkin juice at him and gets little Xavan Zabini full in the face instead. Josie Edgecombe-Chang leaps up with a basket of honey rolls and shouts 'For Gryffindor!' - and it's all downhill from there.

 

* * *

 

Professor Longbottom assigns him and Tomlinson clean-up duty and a Saturday detention tending to two Needy Nodules.  
  
'You're hideous,' Tomlinson says fondly. His Needy Nodule goes smooth and purple all over, wiggles a little further out of the soil. Zayn's remains green, bristly, and unimpressed.  
  
'I like your…spikes,' he says. His Nodule burrows further underground. He wishes Niall were here.  
  
'I thought Hufflepuffs were supposed to be good at Herbology?' Tomlinson says, in a lordly tone. Seems he thinks he's still speaking to one of his underlings.  
  
'I thought Austins were supposed to be Gryffindors?' says Zayn. His Nodule flinches silver and disappears beneath the soil.

 

* * *

 

Xavan demands a sheaf of Zayn’s old Transfiguration Notes and eight Chocolate Frogs before he’ll forgive him. ‘Make that nine,’ he corrects, when Josie steals another one and stuffs it into her mouth.  
  
’ _And_ you have to sneak us into Hogsmeade next weekend,’ Josie puts in imperiously, if a little messily. She reminds him of Liyha for a moment - that’s the only reason he wandlessly cleans the smudges around her mouth.  
  
'Not a chance,' he says. Josie goes bright pink and scowls.  
  
'Are you sure you can't take us?' Xavan says, wiggling his eyebrows about like a mad thing. 'Are you surrre?'  
  
'Uh, pretty sure, yea,' says Zayn, smiling a little. Second years are strange.  
  
'Stop pretending to be a Veela, Zabini,' scolds Payne, tapping him on the back of his head with a rolled up _Quidditch Quarterly_. His Prefect badge roars tinnily as he grins at Zayn. ‘Er, _saluta_.’  
  
Zayn dips his head in acknowledgement, ignoring Josie and Xavan’s giggles. Ever since they became sixth years, Payne insists on using an archaic duelling greeting with him, even though it’s these days only properly used in very old-fashioned, very unromantic courting rituals. Still - a Muggleborn can’t know any better, and it’s not Zayn’s place to teach him.  
  
Besides, Payne may be a bit dull, but he’s a good enough sort. He’s responsible, kind…wicked athletic. Friends with Niall and, since fourth year, determined to be friends with Zayn, too.  
  
Might’ve taken the Hat’s advice on chivalry a bit too seriously, though, Zayn thinks, a little later, after negotiations with Josie and Xavan have ceased, when Payne jogs across the Common Room to swing open the Portrait for him.  
  
'So I hear your family's opening a new bookstore in Diagon Alley,' Payne says, hopping out of the Portrait hole after him. The Finnegan triplets pass them with suspicious leering smiles. 'Sounds neat.'  
  
It's awful, actually, Doniya and Father have been rowing about it for months - but that's barely his business, and it's certainly not Payne's. 'Should be,' he says, smiling quickly. One more staircase and one more hallway - then he’ll go left to the library, Payne will go right to the Pitch, and they’ll be rid of each other.  
  
'You must be excited. All those books…' Payne gestures vaguely.  
  
'Yea…' Zayn agrees vaguely.  
  
They walk in silence. Sunday, after dinner, most students and Professors are in their rooms, busily preparing for the coming week. Oh, how I wish that was me, Zayn thinks, glum.  
  
Payne slows in the middle of the hallway; Zayn slows down with him without really thinking about it. By the time he realises what his body’s done, it’s too late to speed up and escape.  
  
'So I heard Josie mention something about Hogsmeade,' Payne starts, likely aiming to eke out another pointless conversation. Zayn forces a polite expression onto his face, sends up a silent prayer for assistance.  
  
For once Allah (swt) hears him.  
  
'Off to the library again, eh, Malik?' Zayn stops listening, runs over to the stairwell and squints down into the low-lit distance. He can recognise Niall's smile even without his glasses on.  
  
'Niall,' he says, too quiet, and then too loud: 'Niall!'  
  
'Alright, alright, quit your yellin',' Niall grouses, leaping up next to Zayn before the staircase has fully stopped moving. He sways a little, off-balance; Zayn steadies his bag. They pat each other's arms dumbly for a few seconds before Niall rolls his eyes and pulls Zayn up into a hug. Briefly, the floor disappears beneath his feet.  
  
He always underestimates how strong Niall is.  
  
'Heya,' says Niall, breath warm against the shell of his ear.  
  
'Hey,' Zayn says. His voice cracks a little, even. Has it really only been a week? He gives one final squeeze, then forces himself to let go. 'Didn't think you were due in 'till midnight.'  
  
'Eh,' Niall says, waving a hand, 'Greg got sick a' me. Said my general atmosphere was too much for everyone to handle.'  
  
'Oh, did he, really,' Zayn says. 'Hope 'Thea wasn't too poorly off, by comparison.'  
  
'I mean, she was _al_ -right, for a baby. Mostly my influence, though,’ Niall says, beaming. He crinkles up his eyebrows at something over Zayn’s shoulder. ‘Oi, Styles - quit hoggin’ the photos!’  
  
Zayn whirls around. Styles steps neatly onto the landing next to them, flicking through another photo without looking up. ‘Adorable,’ he says, in that morbid voice of his. He raises his eyes slowly to Zayn’s; doesn’t blush. ‘Did you want to see them?’  
  
It feels like the world’s gone cracked all around the edges. Zayn’s fairly certain _he’s_ blushing. ‘Nah, I can look at them later. I should. I should probably go study,’ he manages.  
  
'Should've been in Ravenclaw,' Styles murmurs, smiling. He bends his neck, goes back to looking at the photos.  
  
'Should have been, yea,' Zayn agrees.

 


	3. Chapter 3

  
  
Horan's master plan to make them all mates -- 'hang out with me, if you're that nervous around him' -- seems to have one huge, glaring flaw: Zayn is avoiding them both.  
  
Horan shrugs when he raises the possibility. 'Nah, he's got, like, essays and stuff.' He slaps Harry on the back, as determined to be unawkward around him as ever. 'Your boy's mad driven!'  
  
Privately Harry wonders at the etiquette behind calling someone who seems to loathe you _yours_ ; he feels warmed all the same. Aloud, he wonders which essay talking to Liam Payne is required for.  
  
'Oh, he was talkin' to Liam?' Horan says, and his smile goes a little flat. 'Huh.'

 

* * *

 

Horan isn't going to be an idiot forever, Harry knows. But he is just now, and that's all that Harry needs.

 

* * *

 

Louis and El emerge from their love nest long enough to try and talk him out of it. 'You have to know he's never going to give you a second look,' Lou says, head in El's lap. 'He's far too stupid.'  
  
Zayn's been first in their year since as long as they've been at Hogwarts. Ever since Rose Weasley graduated, he's been first in the entire school. He'd very obviously never tied anyone up before, and still he waited until Harry was calmed down and lucid enough before he walked him back to the dungeons. And he doesn't even _like_ Harry.  
  
'He's not stupid,' Harry says, mildly.  
  
'Not good enough for Ravenclaw,' El murmurs, eyes lowered and dreamy, 'not good enough for you.' Lou leans up to kiss her. Harry looks away.

 

* * *

 

It's not because Harry's a bloke that Zayn doesn't like him. He gets on with plenty of blokes, for his upbringing. And it's not because he's not pureblood either: Zayn tutored Liam in fourth year no problem. And he had that comic thing going with Thomas until she transferred out.  
  
(Anyway - Nick always went around calling himself a 'thoroughbred', and Zayn didn't seem to care for him at all.)  
  
It can't be because Harry's in Slytherin: before Louis played that awful joke on Zayn they got on pretty well. Plus in third year he had that really obvious crush on Rebecca and always asked her to read his Potions essays.  
  
Anthony Riach doesn't come from a rich family, either, so it's not that; loads of kids sit out on Samhain, so it's not that, either; and Horan sleeps around even more than he does, so it's definitely not that.  
  
It's nothing specific, no one thing that he can change.  
  
It's just him.

 

* * *

 

Zayn sits with Sibylla and Chartreuse in the Great Hall, revises with Jasminder and Maura in the library, carries a slim book on Runes and grins when Leigh, Laura and Leslie flit about him in the halls. In Potions he partners with Telina Kensington, whose boyfriend once blacked Harry's eye because he complimented her socks. (And because, well. he fucked her.) He goes to Hogsmeade with Dani and Grizzie, chats politely with Liam, and gives Harry and Horan a very wide berth.  
  
No one else seems bothered, or worried, or jealous: everyone knows Zayn's a virgin. What's _he_ going to do?

 

* * *

 

The Maliks' ways are widely known.  
  
If ever there was a family so traditional as to be eccentric, they would be it. They flew into Britain forever ago, after the War of Ages, and have been plenty proper and paranoid ever since. They're peculiarly well-off, even by pureblood standards; the women are bold and brilliant, the men retiring and reclusive. This all, according to Louis.  
  
'Arse-backwards,' according to Nick.  
  
Harry heard about them the minute he got onto the Express: how they were breaking with convention, sending their precious only son away for schooling. It was entirely by accident, actually, that he ended up meeting Zayn. He'd gone to the loo to change his shirt -- no one he'd spoken with had recognised Aéropostale, though one girl'd said his popped collar looked kind of cool and retro, 'if you were into that sort of thing' -- and maybe to hide a little, from all the other Harrys, when he tripped straight into a boy with black hair, a heavy book, and a tiny smile.  
  
'-- _How low does the moon hang?_ ' the boy'd said, singsong lilt echoing in the stalls around them. Harry remembers thinking it was kind of early in their acquaintanceship for poetry recitation, but he was so clearly interested, Harry couldn't help but be interested back.  
  
'Uh, pretty low?' he'd replied, kind of laughing a little. The boy's face slammed shut: Harry even wondered if some magic was involved, he'd felt so cold.  
  
'Wow! haven't heard that one since me nan passed,' said a voice from the doorway.  A friendly-faced blondeish fellow with a sloppy cloak collar and blue hands was stood behind them. He grinned - his teeth were very crooked - and cleared his throat when they looked at him. ' _Th' moon hangs low enough ta see th' sun an' stars_. Eh, pass and pass, five turns, brightn'in' skies - I forget th' rest.' He went to the sink on the other side of Harry, who rather felt as though he was watching one of Gem's arthouse films, without the subtitles. 'No one younger than 40 talks like that, though, I reckon!'  
  
The other boy's face was lit up tentatively in the mirror. ' _I'm_ not 40,' he said, very properly, speaking around Harry, 'I'm 11. How old are you?'  
  
'I too am 11,' said the second boy, whistling a little. He turned the tap on without moving his hands. Harry really hated him. 'M'name's Niall.' He glanced at the first boy and grinned. 'Or--' here he adopted a heavy, droll accent, the likes of which Harry had spent practising for hours and hours '--second son, of th' House of Horan. If y'like.'  
  
'Oh,' said the first boy, and he smiled, as if he _did_ like. Pretty, Harry thought, and then he blushed. 'I've heard of you.'  
  
'Can't say th' same,' said Niall, amiably. 'What do they call you, then?'  
  
'I'm Harry,' said Harry, and then he felt like a complete berk.  
  
'Zayn,' said Zayn, ignoring him entirely, 'second borne, of the House of Malik. Greatly pleased and, um, honoured to pass names with you.'  
  
Niall threw his head back and cackled. The tower of blue bubbles in front of him gurgled and gurgled and grew. Zayn looked starry-eyed.  
  
'You're wicked funny, mate, pleasure's all mine,' said Niall, again turning the water off wandlessly. He clapped his dripping hands together - steam rose up, and then they were dry.  
  
Harry, who at that time was only used to his Gran taking her wand off the mantle to rewarm his cocoa when he begged, squeezed his shirt in his hands and felt queasily inadequate.  
  
'C'mon, where're you sittin'?' Niall continued, walking backwards. 'I'm with the Finnegans, they're dyin' to meetcha.' He glanced at Harry, smiled widely. 'You can come too, Harry.'  
  
The look Zayn shot him when he passed persuaded him to stay behind.

 

* * *

 

Horan's never been avoided by anyone in his life. What would he know about it.

 

* * *

  
  
Obvious exceptions aside, Horan'll give pretty much anyone a go - everyone knows about his thing for Ravenclaws though. Once the rest of the table's distracted by his shameless flirting with Jas, Harry slides in quick next to Zayn. Leans over his shoulder to get a better look at his Arithmancy homework.  
  
Zayn smells like pressed blue eider: crisp, sweet and slightly bitter. 'Horan's pretty smooth, huh,' says Harry, breathing in very quietly.  
  
Zayn moves away with a pointed stiffness. '--And it doesn't bother you?'  
  
'It'd be a bit hypocritical for it to.' Harry considers. 'Though I'm not smooth, really. Just easy.' He catches Maura staring and winks. She blushes and rolls her eyes. Her boyfriend's Daniel Prince-Pensley. 7th year, fairly even-tempered, for a Gryffindor with no real prospects in life. Good lad. Horrible in bed.  
  
'Oh,' says Zayn, putting his quill down. He gives Harry that new, considering look - Harry holds his gaze, doesn't think about ropes, doesn't blush, doesn't blink. 'So you two aren't...?'  
  
Ah. And it all makes sense. 'Nah,' Harry says. 'Afraid he'd be a little too much for me to handle.'  
  
Zayn hmms, pushes his glasses up, keeps fiddling with his calculations.  
  
'You missed a 1 here,' Harry bullshits, pointing at random. He hides a grin when he notices Horan watching. 'Who's Al Krazmi?'

 

* * *

 

Horan takes the news of their break-up pretty well; the rest of it, not so much.  
  
'Fine time for him to get gun-shy!,' he grouses, 'here I am, makin' myself into a third wheel for _his_ sake and he's nowhere to be found.'  
  
'Maybe he thought we were serious,' Harry suggests. Terrible thought. 'It is pretty considerate of him.' Horan shrugs, tosses an orb of yellow light impatiently from palm to palm; flashy as ever. 'You'd probably do the same too, wouldn't you? If Zayn and I were, you know. Dating.'  
  
Horan smiles, bright and a little cool; the orb vanishes into thin air. 'Nah,' he says, and he tousles Harry's hair roughly. 'I'd just wait ya out.'

 

* * *

 

That night he skips dinner and eats Maura out in one of the many abandoned siderooms that he's repurposed for his own usage. He hasn't used this one in a while - another room on the Wing needed a tricky bit of Dark Magic untangled and the entire floor was closed off for three weeks. It's dusty now, and a little cold because of the rain, and they giggle and sneeze.  
  
'So this is where the magic happens,' she says afterwards, flopping back against the little conjured mattress. She wasn't raised in a magical household, either; sometimes it shows.  
  
'Yea,' he says, wetly nuzzling her thigh. She pats him on the head, gives him a sloppy handjob, threatens to kill him if he tells anyone.  
  
He kisses her between her breasts, says of course, of course. You don't get around with as many people as he has without learning a little discretion.

 

* * *

 

Or a lot of it, rather.

 

* * *

 

Mum's name got erased off the family tree when she decided to marry his dad, and she more or less pretended magic wasn't real until the day Harry conjured up a grape juice thunderstorm one clear spring afternoon at tea. Gem tells him about it all the time - not the aftermath, Dad screaming and leaving, Mum locking herself in her room and crying; all of that he vaguely remembers for himself.  
  
Gem says she'd always suspected, though; that that was the day she knew it was real, too.  
  
Anyway. It was hard for a while after that - they got kicked out of their place and had to move in with Gran (who, when she first saw Harry, raised her eyebrows and murmured, 'well, aren't you a greedy boy'). All Mum ever seemed to do was shout and cry. Harry and Gem weren't allowed to see their old friends, and were deemed far too 'hopeless' for polite company.  
  
No one else wanted them, though, so. It was where they stayed.

 

* * *

  
  
Horan and Zayn are as chummy as ever at breakfast the next day. Harry figures he's being allowed to fall to the wayside, tells himself he doesn't mind.  
  
Lou sips at his tea, pats him on the thigh, and doesn't speak.  
  
'Cheer up, sweethalf,' El says, since Lou's too sleepy to. 'Eat something before you fall over.' Harry looks at the piles of buttery eggs, the stacks of sticky-sweet toast, the crispy, congealed bacon and bangers.  
  
He imagines Gran's face, shining in the grease, and shoves a spoonful of porridge in his mouth instead. He takes so long to eat that he's almost late for Methodologies of Music. It's his favourite class. Somewhere, however, in between the Great Hall and the winding, stationary staircase that often goes up to the Music Room and often goes out to the greenhouses, Zayn plucks at his sleeve and pushes him into an alcove, murmuring, 'I hope you're not busy...?'  
  
Tuesday and Thursday mornings Zayn has a free period for independent study. Harry knows this about Zayn; Zayn knows nothing whatsoever about him.  
  
'Not at all,' he says, and kindly leads the way to one of his rooms.

 

* * *

 

'I spoke with a few people,' Zayn says, glancing dubiously about them. He does not look like he's tempted to say 'So this is where the magic happens?' 'They said you're very...good.'  
  
Harry feels personally responsible for the sagging coat rack in the corner. He shrugs. Doesn't trust himself to speak.  
  
Zayn turns, wordlessly casts a few spells Harry knows he's not allowed to ask about. Only Louis gets nasty about maternal magic; everyone else just goes silent and offended.  
  
The raised mattress begins to resemble a proper bed: the covers soften, the dais thins up into a frame. The air around them feels warmer, kinder somehow. He feels...safe. Cherished.  
  
So this is what it feels like to be a Malik, huh.  
  
Zayn stows his wand away, then turns to look up at him. He's very lovely, very cold, very still. 'Will you be patient with me?'  
  
Harry's hands are trembling. 'Yes,' he rasps, and he goes forward.

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

'None of that rope stuff,' Zayn warns, and that's fine, Styles says that's fine; he's cut, Styles isn't, and he says that's also fine. Zayn yelps when he feels the cold tingling up his arse for the first time - but Styles just mouths kisses down his back until he's rocking back into the stretch, hot and stupid all over, and that's fine, too.  
  
Styles doesn't laugh when he comes easily, messily, quickly, licks him up without complaint, tongues his balls until Zayn shudders away. Doesn't seem surprised that Zayn wants it all the time, that he goes hours unable to read a single bloody word even for pleasure, he, who could float books into his crib before he could talk!, him, unable to read, too busy thinking about all the filthy things he wants to do: licking up Styles's crack, fucking him in and out with his tongue, coming all over his face, tying him up and leaving him beneath his bed, wanting, waiting, wet.

 

* * *

 

Was I any good? Zayn asks, once and only once, that first time; he turns over, immediately embarrassed, but Styles just kisses him and kisses him and says he did fine.

 

* * *

 

Styles teaches him everything.  
  
He kisses up the inside of Zayn's thighs, tells him it's important to keep open and honest communication; better to use too much lube than not enough, Zayn may not like it flavoured but some people do. And the spells are good now and then, but it's better to do it with your fingers. The Muggle way, he says, grinning, two fingers pressed deep inside of Zayn. He's big; they often need a third. Take your time with foreplay, he says, and he doesn't laugh when Zayn gets hard, just from rotten kissing. Unless your partner is impatient! he says, and then he does laugh, a little, breathless and shocked, when Zayn lowers himself onto his cock.

 

* * *

 

How did he go so many years without having sex? Zayn wonders, the first time he has to turn in an essay as is, not three days before, like usual, but five minutes after class starts, along with everyone else. How does anyone possibly get anything done?  
  
By early October, it's already routine.  
  
He falls asleep in Potions. Telina has to wake him before he falls into the burner; he almost singes his eyebrows. Professor Slughorn takes a half point off his Replenishing Rub, because the consistency's a little too viscous, and Styles grins at him across the room.

 

* * *

 

Something they don't tell you about sex: it's okay to laugh, and mess up.

 

* * *

 

Zayn was worried, at first, that Styles would be strange about it. Would talk about him, would try to talk to him; would misunderstand their arrangement. But Tomlinson's so wrapped up in Calder that he barely pays Styles any mind, and he certainly doesn't ever act as though Styles has asked him to be a little nicer to Zayn, for his sake. Outside of class, Styles walks past him and Niall without looking back.

 

* * *

 

Professor Longbottom calls on him at random that Monday: 'Three signs that a Marugan Mollusk is dangerously overripe?'

The answer is, of course: acrid odour, bleached vines, and a slimy base. Zayn opens his mouth to answer - and suddenly envisions Styles twisting his pubic hair and kissing behind his balls. He goes red and speechless and horrified.

Niall answers the question for him, and ducks out of class before Zayn can even gather his things. He's always running off somewhere, these days.

 

* * *

 

On Samhain, Zayn sits out for the first time; he wrote his mum two days ago, said he wouldn't see her or the girls because he was feeling poorly.  
  
Styles gives him a blowjob and then fucks him till he's hard again, jerks him off slow and easy, sighs, kisses his neck when he comes. The Slytherin dorms are all empty; Styles wipes them both down with a flannel, changes out his sheets, and gets dressed in a hurry.  
  
'Where are you going?' Zayn asks, sleepy and sore, but still throbbing with it.  
  
'Oh,' Styles shrugs, 'Nick's up in Hogsmeade for the weekend. We're probably gonna meet up, and, you know. Chill.' He pulls on his cloak, stows his wand, slips a condom into the back pocket of his jeans. Some people like the feel of plastic, he said once. 'Can you turn out the lights, when you leave?'

 

* * *

 

Early November, Slytherin demolishes Hufflepuff, 200 nill. Harry wears a Hufflepuff scarf, bright and obvious against the sea of green; he laughs at something invisible on his celluphane when they lose.  
  
'Ha ha ha,' mocks Niall, who's of course in a mood over it: he was too slow, and Leigh caught the Snitch. 'Bloody fuckin' halvers.'  
  
Zayn tries to think about what his parents would say, if they heard he was letting a half-blood fuck him, and can't get to sleep that night for hours.

 

* * *

 

They fuck a lot anyway.  
  
They don't go to each other's rooms beyond a handful of times - Tomlinson would eviscerate him if he ever caught him, probably, and Niall doesn't seem all that keen on Styles these days, for whatever reason.  
  
Zayn figured out the trick to the Prefect's bathroom third year - fool the runes into thinking, just for a little bit, that a student's trapped inside - and they fuck in the bath till the water goes down, lukewarm, slippery, sweet. Styles squeezes his balls too soon and he nearly blacks out. When he comes to, Harry smooths his hair back, a little worried, says, it's important to respect your partner's wishes, in that stupid swottish voice of his that means he's not going to ask, so of course Zayn ends up getting fucked over the rim of the tub.  
  
They go through all of Harry's drafty rooms once, and then twice; give each other handjobs in the blind spot behind the old Defence classroom; go silent and still when Peeves floats by, muttering to himself; kiss for hours in the library, in the soundproof cubicles in the back, layers of Disillusionment charms curved over their skin; hold hands and make silly faces at night, at the base of the Astronomy Tower, picking up stray bluebells before the frost kills them all, because Arnie likes the smell.

 

* * *

 

One day, when Niall's off being tetchy, Char mentions that Harry has lately been playing hard to get.  
  
'Oh, and how would you know?' Sibylla asks, innocently. Char's like Zayn; she's been betrothed since she was 3.  
  
'Shut up,' she says, blushing. 'It's just something I heard.'  
  
'I'm sure,' says Sibylla. Char scowls, and an errant wind comes and tugs Zayn's scarf away.

 

* * *

 

Zayn sends away for a huge shipment of lube without thinking about it, just before hols. Pomfrey's out of free samples for the month -- holiday cheer spreading quite well apparently --  and Harry can't afford any on his own, and he actually refuses to touch Zayn without it. And he hates using lotion for anything other than a wank.

('You could just use a spell. Or spit,' Zayn says, after two days of only seeing Harry in passing, tagging along behind Tomlinson and Calder, laughing on his celluphane, flirting with the pretty new graduate students from Beauxbatons. Harry shakes his head and says, no, just spit hurts. And I want to feel you.)  
  
Anyway he sends away for it without really thinking about it. Somebody at Gringotts or Bodybite has a leaky fucking mouth, though, because somehow his _mum_ finds out.

She makes him come home early for Michaelmas.

 

* * *

 

Before Doniya married Umar, she always used to bring her boys to the dinner table. 'Kev and I were planning on going for a walk,' she'd say - Mum would wink and she wouldn't be seen until the next morning.  
  
'Youth only happens once,' Mum'd say, and Father would smile and put his books away for a kiss.

 

* * *

 

Mum says: 'We love you.'  
  
She says: 'We didn't send you to Hogwarts for this. You said you wanted friends your own age. We've looked past their paltry accommodations all these years.'  
  
She says: 'Your grandmother hasn't been in her portrait all day.'  
  
She says: 'What would your fiancée say?'  
  
She says: 'This isn't acceptable behaviour.'  
  
She says: 'We don't want to see you hurt.'  
  
She says: 'Darling, speak to your son.'  
  
His father prays and says: 'Heed your mother.'

 

* * *

 

Zayn really doesn't like crying in front of other people. Their pet Kneazle, Soraya, had a fever once; she mistook him for an intruder and tore out a chunk of his leg. He said he was fine after his nurse stitched him up, refused the pain potion because Liyha was watching, went back to playing as usual. When he finished dinner, he said goodnight, went up to his room and cried his eyes out.  
  
He cries now, though, huge, gaping sobs that shock his parents into silence. He says he feels ashamed, says he's disgusted with himself. He surrenders a fourth of the lube (certain he'd be in monastery somewhere far away if his mum knew how much he'd actually bought), says he's sorry for being inappropriate and for squandering their trust, offers to do a Renewed Chastity Vow. And when they tell him no! of course not, he's forgiven, of course he's forgiven, they love him so much, they're so proud of him, he Floos back to school a half-day early to give Harry his gift -- Everlasting Gloves, charmed with a Forget-Me-Not -- and fucks him till his voice cracks.  
  
What's got into _you_ , Harry murmurs, after, voice hoarse and a little awed, and Zayn shrugs, like a very common bloodtraitor, and he says, teach me how to tie you up.

 

* * *

 

Another thing they don't tell you: it's easy to get confused, and think you're in love.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Re: condoms - I'm partial to the theory that magic has rendered them a matter of preference; otherwise I would've tagged it with unsafe sex. #safetyfirst
> 
> anyway this is all shit so lol


End file.
